Wednesday, November 30, 2016

Not wanting to be moved from center is an issue better left for a new club to sort out.

Trading McCutchen, however, would enable the Pirates to re-allocate payroll to other areas. It also would enable them to move Starling Marte from left field to center without conflict; McCutchen does not want to switch to an outfield corner, sources say.

This is a free agent signing I can see for the Yankees. Of course, the Orioles will have a chance to prevent it.

What does the 2018 Yankees infield look like? — Adam G. @adamGobj

We’re still 18 months away from that, but my guess would be Gary Sanchez behind the plate, Greg Bird at first base, Gleyber Torres at second base, Didi Gregorius at shortstop and Starlin Castro at third base. Castro could remain at second and Torres could move to third, but I think the Yankees envision Torres playing ...

MLB will contain costs for international players. It’s going to happen. The draft, however, seems like a really bad way of doing it.

“The focus is on that next generation of players,” Rosario said. “Just like we benefitted from having the opportunity, we feel that the next generation deserves to have the same opportunity that we did.”

I fear I’m belaboring the point here, so let’s cut to it. Carter’s bat has value, and with their DH position wide open, the Red Sox are in a unique position to extract it. But what Carter also brings to the proverbial table is flexibility. The Red Sox don’t want to commit $100 million and five years to Encarnacion, they don’t want to sacrifice a draft pick to sign him or Bautista, and they don’t want to give a 40-year-old Beltran a multi-year contract. They have some ...

Previously, baseball has relied on the highly subjective statistic of Defensive Runs Saved used by the sabermetrics community to evaluate defenders. Statcast™, through its tracking devices, can replace that with an objective measure of route efficiency based on the flight of the ball and the defender’s route to it.

“To be able to determine whether or not [Jarrod] Dyson or anyone else took the proper route,” Wakamatsu said, “is something we as coaches can use ...

Do writers just reflexively add the Yankees to every big contract acquisition?

Yankees
In order to fit McCutchen into the lineup, New York would have to trade left fielder Brett Gardner (and there have been rumors of that) or scrap the plans to start rookie Aaron Judge in right field. The former seems more likely, and the Yankees have the farm system (and finances) to pull off a McCutchen deal.

The proposed international draft has been taken off the table. The rest of this stuff should be resolvable with a little give and take.

Both sides said they were optimistic a deal could be reached even though several significant issues remain unresolved.
Among them:
• Luxury-tax threshold
• Draft-pick compensation tied to the signing of free agents
• A proposed international draft
• Roster sizes and days off
• Changes in the Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program
• Pace-of-play ...

It was in Baltimore that the seeds of Johnson’s career as a manager took root. A graduate of Trinity University with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics, Johnson devoured Earnshaw Cook’s Percentage Baseball, a proto-sabermetric tome, and persuaded Orioles owner Jerry Hoffberger to let him use the IBM mainframe of the National Brewery (of which Hoffberger was chairman), which he programmed to test his theories about baseball. Johnson came ...

Tyler Chatwood‘s changeup has never been good, but it really looks like he’s tinkering with it, no matter which classification system you’re using. By PITCHf/x, he added nearly two inches of fade and over an inch of drop. Meanwhile, he began throwing the fastball harder and change slower, improving the gap between the two pitches by 2.5 mph, the biggest difference in the sample of 92.

That’s according to the generic PITCHf/x classifications from MLB, at least. According to Brooks ...

Bellinger’s prospect stock continues to rise as his lean body gains strength, helping his swing work better. He was Glendale’s most productive hitter this fall, producing a .314/.424/.557 slash line, with three home runs in 70 at-bats with 14 walks. With above-average bat speed and plenty of leverage in his swing, Bellinger, 21, projects to eventually have plus power. The consensus among AFL scouts is that his first base ...

I just don’t see the Red Sox being in on Encarnacion. I also find it unlikely the Yankees will get in on him too.

The guesstimate: His market is very likely limited to American League teams and he’s tied to Draft-pick compensation, but this could be the source of a good old-fashioned battle between the Yankees and Red Sox, which would obviously be beneficial for Encarnacion’s bank account. Don’t rule out the Astros, though they might be hesitant to part with a Draft pick.

“He’s the modern-day Babe Ruth,” a Pacific Rim scout from an American League team said. “He’s a top-of-the-rotation pitcher and the middle-of-the-order hitter. We haven’t seen anything like him in modern times. Whenever he comes to America, he’s going to break the bank. There has never been anybody in free agency who could ever market themselves as a two-way player before.”

Players cannot become free agents in the NPB until they accumulate nine years of service time.

CBA update. As I mentioned when I posted another article, I can see tying draft picks to going over the international pool as a compromise. I’m not sure I can see the players wanting to tie picks to the luxury tax. Of course, to get unfettered free agency and other perks, they will have to move on something.

The last big hurdle for MLB and the union in CBA talks is the competitive balance tax, sources said. Commonly referred to as a luxury tax, it is used by sports leagues to penalize teams that ...

Tuesday, November 29, 2016

The Atlanta Braves still don’t know where in Florida they will move their spring training operations in 2019, but that is not stopping them from sending campaign donations to key state legislators who could help them with stadium financing when they do find a new home.

Earlier this month, the Braves gave $1,000 to a political committee run by new Senate Appropriations chairman Jack Latvala, R-Clearwater. That is just months after the team sent $1,000 donations each to new ...

Salaries of baseball players in the American League who were signed at high figures to retain them during the war with the Federal League will be sharply reduced, B.B. Johnson, president of the league, announed [last night]. The game was conducted in an extravagant manner during the fight with the Federal League, President Johnson said, and all expenses connected with the operation of the sport next season will be curtailed.

[T]he Brewers announced a three-year deal with a club option for a fourth year with free agent Eric Thames, who played the last three seasons in the Korean Baseball Organization. Jerry Crasnick of ESPN.com reported the deal is worth more than $15 million.

....

During three years playing for the NC Dinos of the hitter-friendly KBO, Thames put together fantasy league offensive numbers, batting .348 over 388 games with a .450 on-base percentage and .720 slugging percentage.

1. His name is a mouthful
Born April 26, 1995, in Santo Domingo of the Dominican Republic, Mazara’s full name is Nomar Shamir Mazara Jiminian. He was asked by lonestarball.com about his name: “Well, my mother and father just liked the names Nomar and Shamir, Jiminian is my mother’s last name.”—from Lone Star Ball’s report, Nomar Mazara-The Big Chill

Bench/Prospects
Third-base prospect Jeimer Candelario (2.4 zWAR) didn’t experience much success in his brief exposure to the majors at the beginning of July, but he’s already projected to play like an average major leaguer and his top historical comp is Edwin Encarnacion. He and outfielder Albert Almora (1.8) represent the best of the club’s young depth, while Chesny Young (1.0) appears to be a possible fixture among the Fringe Five. The depth ...